If you want to see how wrong Mr. Heroux is about this claim on how murder rates changed after the UK handgun ban see the figures available here.

Lott has also noted that the common denominator of the recent mass shootings is that they all occurred in a gun free zone. This implication is that the shooters targeted the zones because they were gun free. This can't and won't be proven, and it is unlikely anyway. First, we know that students all over America carry guns to schools every day, so schools are not really gun free. Second, Fort Hood is a military base with lots of guns, and Virginia Tech is a university with its own police force. Third, there is more reason to believe that the recent mass shootings targeted the people at the locations because of who they were, not because of where they were. The presence or absence of a gun ban is spurious. . . .

There are 41 right-to-carry states. What gun-free zones mean places where law-abiding citizens are not allowed to carry concealed handguns. The ban is with respect to law-abiding citizens, not police. Yet, with Fort Hood, soldiers are actually forbidden from carrying around guns on army bases (see here for a discussion). As to the claim that "the recent mass shootings targeted the people at the locations because of who they were, not because of where they were" please see this article.

3 Comments:

"Second, Fort Hood is a military base with lots of guns"and what he forgets is that the Clinton administration issued an order that forbids military personnel to carry sidearms or other firearms"Beginning in March 1993, under the Clinton administration, the army forbids military personnel from carrying their own personal firearms and mandates that "a credible and specific threat against [Department of the Army] personnel [exist] in that region" before military personnel "may be authorized to carry firearms for personal protection.""